Age-related differences in memory for time, temporal reconstruction, and the availability and use of temporal landmarks

Abstract

We examined the accuracy of memory for the time of an event, the use of temporal reconstruction, and the availability and use of temporal landmarks from late middle childhood to adulthood. Children, adolescents, and adults (N=128) viewed a film during a campus visit. Eight months later, we asked them to (a) recall the time of the previous visit on a range of time scales; (b) explain how they arrived at those estimates; and (c) provide other dateable events from their lives (temporal landmarks). The accuracy of time judgments increased with age on the day-of-the-week and month time scales only. All age groups used reconstruction to arrive at their estimates for most of the time scales tested. Reports of dateable events from past years indicated that the availability of temporal landmarks increased across this age range. These results reflect a mixture of similarities and differences across the ages tested. (C) 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Publisher

Elsevier

Publication Date

1-1-2016

Publication Title

Cognitive Development

Department

Psychology

Document Type

Article

DOI

https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cogdev.2015.12.003

Keywords

Memory for time, Dating, Reconstruction, Temporal landmark, Distance-based processes

Language

English

Format

text

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